


To the Victor

by rabbitprint



Category: Final Fantasy XII
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-05-14
Updated: 2007-05-14
Packaged: 2017-10-07 14:55:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/66238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rabbitprint/pseuds/rabbitprint
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pre-game, minor spoilers. Fran/Drace. While on the hunt, Fran finds that she is not the only one seeking a particular Mark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To the Victor

She cannot move.

There is a rock the size of a fist grinding into her stomach. The ground is bare here, bare and sullen with dust, and Fran can feel the gravel sticking to one cheek where she has been forced against it.

A shadow drapes itself across her face. She cannot turn her head enough to perceive what casts the shape, but she tries, tries _hard_, even as the muscles in the back of her neck begin to scream.

"Strange," the Judge remarks. Metal fingertips slide along the back of Fran's spine. "Ghis has told me that Viera are not like Humes at all when it comes to certain magicks, and yet you fall victim easily enough."

The gauntlet moves up to Fran's shoulder. It skips to the knot of her jaw, tracing the circle of tension as Fran grits her teeth; it moves across Fran's temple, and then flirts with the junction of her ear and skull.

Then the motion grows still, and the Judge's voice comes gentler. "Do you think I am tempted to force my point further, simply because I am the one in control here?"

When nothing happens, Fran realizes she is being waited on to speak. She jerks her arms instead; the gauntlet leaves the lowest inch of her ear and relocates itself to her shoulderblades, pressing down in clear warning. Even though feeling has started to come back into her limbs, the wiry ropes of the netting cords are wound tight as steel, tight as living fire. It hurts.

"Best kill me when you are done," she vows aloud, and then shuts her eyes hard.

But the heavy smell of leather and oil is suddenly replaced by fresh air; the female Judge has stepped away. There is a sudden jerk of Fran's hands, and then she feels -- from a numbed, pinprick-hot distance away -- the cords being unwound.

"The Mark is still out there, Viera. Of the three of us, let us see who will win this game of predator and prey."

* * *

The Cerobi Steppe is unkind. The winds snipe and snarl Fran's hair, ruffling the strands into broken whorls, reminding her each step of the way that her skull is exposed to the elements. The female Judge claimed Fran's cap as a prize.

There is no sign yet of the Albino Wyrm. Fran has seen the Mark posted in half a dozen taverns. She has sized up the competition of the local hunters, and has found them all lacking. She is capable, she is competent, and -- most importantly -- she is hungry.

The Judge left her supplies intact, though half the rations have been crushed during their struggles. Fran picks through the remains with a frown. There is enough dried jerky to ease the pinching of her stomach as she climbs, though she heeds the rumors of the tavern bars: she does not eat until she is full, lest the scent of the spices attract the beast prematurely.

She varies between tracking the beast and tracking the Judge. Both of them leave their prints on the land. The Wyrm leaves gouges where it walks. The Judge treads heavily upon the soil. The shape of the heel is small, smaller than Fran expects, but the metal does more than make up the extra mass.

At night, when the sun has hidden away and taken its heat with it, Fran finds shelter amidst the rocks. There, she fits her body into stone crevices until they warm to her flesh, and tucks her head down, and waits until the dawn comes.

One morning she wakes, and there is a heaviness upon the air. She does not move.

As she waits, her breathing kept shallow and tame, her heartbeat flexing beneath the cage of her fingers, Fran can hear the exhalations of the other mixing with the breeze. The rhythm is even. Either Fran's presence is well concealed past discovery, or it is already far too late to run.

Her answer comes when the sun rolls over the lip of her bolt-hole, and brings with it the smell of fresh blood.

The creature is gone. Fran crawls out with a knife already in each hand, but the creature is gone, and there is only the scrape of dirt on stone to prove where it had stood. Further down the slope, there is a dark-beaked charybterix whose wings are folded underneath its body like shattered kites, and Fran understands the warning before she squats and gathers it up: to weaken so soon would be a shameful thing, and she must keep her strength for the inevitable clash.

The bones are pulped into the meat. Fran picks out what she can, until gore is caked underneath her nails and she wonders -- a little -- if this is the Judge's plan, that Fran smell of spilled blood and attract the smaller monsters first.

Largely, she thinks about the Judge.

* * *

She had brought more than enough supplies with her, or so she thought as she climbed the paths.

Hume culture was less a mystery to her after forty years in their wilds; Fran was well-versed in bounty laws and trophies and the need for proof demonstrated in a parade of battered carcasses, but a Great Wyrm was no one's pocket-toy. She could not lug it across a mountain, or shove it in her pack.

So she had brought knives for the flaying, ones with sharp drop-points. She had brought sawblades braced in bowcurves. She had brought a spear whose heft doubled adequately for parry, and she had brought her best longbow, a virile arch of coldheart yew that -- when unlashed -- had been sturdy enough to sting the nose of a charging behemoth once and allow her to escape.

There had been other weapons, too, but those were the most noteworthy.

She was crouched on the edge of a cliff with her fingers on the smallest knife when her ears picked up warning. Ground-motion on her right flank, moving with just enough speed that it might have been a foraging chocobo, save that the pattern of the steps was irregular. It was stalking.

"This is not what I was hunting for," came a voice before she could turn, curiously mild, curiously light. _It is a female,_ Fran realized, and then, _it is a youngling._

And then she had very little time to realize anything else as metal clinked and instinct took over. She whirled, throwing her body low, not truly expecting an aerial attack; there was no muted groan of a crossbow trigger, nor yawn of a bowstring pull. Other hunters had competed with Fran before. The language of mock-aggression and displays of defense were more than customary.

But instead of a scrawny youth come to challenge, there was a beast in iron standing on the ridge of the hill. There were weights and cords in the creature's hands, spinning in a cruel lasso that shifted as it picked up speed -- and then the dizzying sickness of magick on call wrapped itself around Fran, slowing her just enough that when she hit the ground, she did not know which attack had been the one to fell her.

* * *

The meat is salvageable. When her belly is full, she moves on.

* * *

Without heavy armor to weigh her down, the advantage of speed should belong to Fran. Less in the way of open defense -- but she had planned to use the terrain to compensate, to harry the Wyrm with arrow and agility until it wore itself down, and she could move in for the kill. The tactic would keep her out of range of its breath. The Mark should have few other surprises.

A Judge is a different beast entirely.

Being bound and at another's mercy is a humiliation that does not leave Fran's body for several days. Her skin heals its bruises, but remembers the pain.

_I will be the one to take her the next time,_ she decides, the words tumbling around themselves before finally lining up into a coherent thought. _I will take her first._

* * *

She catches her prey at last while it is away from camp -- there are no packs on the woman, nothing save a supply brace carried in the left hand, basic weapons for defense. The maces are docile in their roosts, swaying with each roll of the woman's stride. She carries a crossbow nocked.

Fran's first arrow glances off the Judge's flank, which was expected; Fran has studied curves long enough to understand how much of the suit of armor is intended for deflection, and she knows the chances of penetration are slim. But the bulbous helmet must hinder peripheral vision, and the weight of the armor must be taxing. The principles of taking down an armored knight are not so much different from baiting a Wyrm.

The return fire consists of an initial shot only. Fran is already behind an outcropping when the crossbow bolt wails by. She waits three heartbeats for a second; when none comes and no rush of feet announces a forward assault, she wagers her prey has gone to ground. On matters of range against melee, there are few compromises.

She peeks around the rocks just enough to confirm her suspicions. The Judge has taken cover. Her back is to the wall. The smaller mace is out, held head-down; the shaft of the weapon is parallel to the Judge's arm, prepared to ward away danger.

Fran has no choice. She rushes first.

The bow is left behind, exchanged for the spear. The shortsword bounces on her hip. When the bolas whirl and rush, Fran is prepared -- a twist of her hands and she feels a sudden mass snagged at the tip of the spear, cords wrapping themselves around the blade and nearly striking her in the face with the weights.

She tries to shed them aside with a graceful flick of the spear, and fails.

The great-mace is drawn faster than Fran expects. Its knotted head swings towards her with a mute promise. It smashes through the haft of the spear without pause; when it connects with the ground where Fran had been standing but a moment ago, she swears she can hear boulders cracking.

The Judge is canny. If Fran can get within arm's reach than the maces will have less inertia behind each blow, let alone be able to connect with her at all -- but each time she steps forward, the Judge steps back, maintaining range. Even when Fran pushes forward rapidly enough to break through the reach of the deadly great-mace, the smaller one snaps up; kept head-down, it makes no pretenses to being wielded aggressively, and does not waver in its defense.

This Judge does not care for risky glories, Fran decides. This Judge is accustomed to patience.

A change in tactics does not succeed. The woman catches on too quickly before Fran can herd her towards the steep edge of the path, or into a cul-de-sac. A shortsword and broken spear are not enough incentive to encourage surrender. The one advantage Fran holds is the rapidity of her offense: she will not grant the Judge an opportunity to weave another magick, so caught up in parry and attack as they are. She will not give the Judge a chance to sing.

In straight melee, she thinks, this Judge might win.

She thinks of being forced against the ground a second time, and that is enough to make her blood howl in anger.

A final option makes its way through the flurry of adrenaline. She feels the Mist stir inside her, and this time, she lets it fly.

The rage takes her under its control like a god scooping a toy off the ground. It is a quickening more powerful than she has allowed herself in years. She drives out both fists together, pumping her arms like pistons that chase the bright fly of the Judge's armor, whirling in a vicious kick to compensate for balance. She breaks anything that appears in the haze of her vision, hearing the scrape of her nails like razors on glass.

When she snaps out of the trance at last, every inch of her already craving the power that has vanished and left her hollow, there are dust clouds steadily expanding in the air where she has struck soil. Deep pockets have been blown out of the cliff behind them. The Judge remains intact, leaning heavily against the wall, but still gripping her maces tight.

"Is that all?" the woman calls out, her voice laced with satisfaction.

Then the hillside collapses.

* * *

When Fran manages to catch her breath, the air has already begun to clear. She feels sick, light-headed, but victorious. The feeling is enough to keep her conscious. It's a start.

The Judge has not been buried whole. They both were fast enough to get out of the way of the worst of the landslide, but the woman's armor is badly dented, and there are stones the size of children on her legs.

Fran approaches warily -- as much as she can when her ears are ringing and she is choking on dust. The great-mace rests an arm's reach away from the Judge. Fran kicks it aside as she passes. The bolas are nowhere to be seen.

The ornate helm gives little indication if the creature inside is still alive. There is no motion when Fran kneels and reaches out to unmask it. Underneath, there is blood, and pale hair, and a face that is unlined. The jaw is still slightly rounded with child-fat. A young woman, Fran estimates, but not untried, that much is certain.

The Judge moans, eyelids fluttering, and Fran is quick to estimate how much strength might be left between them. The Quickening has exhausted her body's reserves; there will be no Curatives until she can rest and replenish her energy.

"Spit," she orders.

The woman's mouth twists in revulsion, but Fran keeps her fingers extended, waiting for comprehension to come. Eventually, either the Judge understands or obeys from lack of other options. It takes a few tries for her to work up enough saliva, and Fran does not flinch as she wipes a thread of spittle off the woman's lips.

She is careful not to let her nails tangle with the Judge's hair as she rubs wettened fingers over the gash on the woman's temple. Some of the blood conceals intact skin beneath. Some does not. "You are rattled," she declares. "I am not certain of more."

The woman's voice is husky with pain. "Well? Shall you leave me here to die?"

Fran does not speak.

After a moment, the Judge's questions sharpen. "Are you here to mock me, then? To demand apology? Stop staring and answer!"

Fran can feel herself blinking steadily, lashes cloudy with dust. She should reply, somehow -- she should be noble and dig out the Judge, or be cruel and simply walk away. She should make some manner of point aloud concerning dignity, or mercy, or any other dramatic, civilized remark. Perhaps a smile, or a regretful frown. There are methods to such things.

Instead, Fran merely watches.

The Hume woman is restless, angry enough to fight her own disorientation. "I know you can understand me. Are you an animal?"

This rouses Fran's senses at last, taking her out of her trance. "My lack of aid for a known enemy condemns me?"

"Beast is as beast does, Viera."

"That makes two of us, then," Fran enunciates, and stands.

She is three steps away from the wreckage when the noise alerts her. The Judge is pushing herself up by laborious inches, shoulders straining, palms pressed against the dirt. She drags her own weight forward by sheer willpower. The smaller rocks shiver and slide away from the armor; the Judge bends her knees like a cripple, but then she is not only gathering her feet, she is _on_ her feet, lumbering forward in an effort not to fall. She is on Fran before there is time to run.

Fran is strong -- but the armor is a dead weight crushing, and she is dizzier than she thought from Mist and landslide both. Her hands slip and struggle; her nails scrabble on the armor with plaintive tinny clicks, nothing like the quickened strength they had before.

"I am Judge Drace of Archadia," the woman growls. "And I do not allow _anyone_ to take advantage of _me_."

_Nor I,_ Fran tries to answer, but all that comes out are the words, surreal: "I am Fran." _Of Eruyt_, she almost continues, _of Golmore, of Nowhere_, but her head is spinning past recovery now and the metal is cold and hot and she cannot breathe. She cannot.

* * *

When she wakes up, it is because her head aches too much to sleep.

She drifts into consciousness only grudgingly, in a slow series of increments that challenge themselves: if she does not move, perhaps she will hurt less, and less, and less, until she finally gives up and opens her eyes.

A campfire is flickering to her left. The light is painful enough that Fran almost shuts her eyes again tight -- almost, but the moment her lids begin to droop, a hot lance drives through her skull, and she finally lifts her head to confront reality.

The Judge is sitting on the near side of the flames. She has kept her helm off -- likely to allow the wound time to air, for there is a bandage around her temple which has already begun to stain. When she glances up to see Fran's motion, there is no malice yet. "You are awake."

She is alive. That much goes without saying. "I am."

The Judge does not give assistance when Fran pushes herself upright, but she does pour half the contents of her own cup into a second one. This, she hands out towards Fran. The liquid inside is warm and smells of cinnamon. There is another spice as well that -- when Fran detects a second aftertaste -- makes her stop drinking instantly, holding herself frozen as she attempts to identify any potential poison.

But the tang is only an herb used in several Arcadian elixirs; Fran has been acquainted with it before, when she was lucky enough to skim rewards from Balfonheim. It numbs the senses, yet brings strength back to the body faster. It is good, in situations where magick is not available.

She swallows her mouthful, and then takes a second.

The Judge is studying her with a detached interest now. "Why hunt you the Albino Wyrm?"

Fran does not do either of them the disservice of lying. "For the bounty. All creatures must find means to survive."

The woman's eyes flick away. "For which I need the Wyrm not. I hunt for my own reasons," she adds without being asked, but without further elaboration either. "The fire will last until morning, by my count. If you desire warmth, you may choose this. Or, you may abandon my camp as you prefer," she concludes, slouching down to settle on her bedroll.

Judge Drace sleeps, Fran notices, with her weapons in her hands and a pack against her stomach. But not all the supplies are directly wedged alongside the Judge's body, and Fran spares the campsite a glance. "You do not anticipate malice?"

"No." Despite the claim, the Judge remains fully armored. Even as she settles her weight, she reaches out for her discarded helm. Despite her best care, she hisses when she attempts to slowly wedge the armor on, and Fran speaks again:

"You may sleep with it off." Glancing away out of politeness, Fran adds, "the fire will keep track of our cease."

Surprisingly, the conversation does not end there. The Judge sets her helmet down and pours a second draught. "You Viera wear so little for protection. Do you not fear injury?"

The warmth of the elixir is spreading through Fran's limbs. Fear is banished by the heat. If her skullcap is hidden somewhere the Judge's camp, she cannot see it. This is disappointing. The cap had been a gift from Mjrn many years ago, carefully stitched in dark leather and coiled metal, so that the wires resemble delicate ivy strands creeping up from the base of the skull. It had been a token of congratulations from her sister; Fran has kept it in exacting repair.

She considers her options, and takes another deep drink from her cup.

The Judge does not seem disturbed by the lack of an answer to her question. She downs the rest of her elixir in one brisk gulp before setting the mug aside. "I have been told the Viera are different from Humes," she muses aloud, genially, "but I think you are very much the same."

"We both have need for rest," Fran reminds her, and then says no more.

But even when the Judge has succumbed to sleep first, and the seductive hum of the elixir is whispering of blissful unconsciousness, Fran fights to remain awake. She watches the firelight lick over metal arms and metal legs. She watches the firelight, and the bare face that waits within reach.

* * *

She leaves with the night, both of them taking their cue from the dawn. The fire has burned low. There are enough embers banked that she decides she has done her fair share of tending the flames; Fran, at least, has upheld her half of the impromptu peace, which is enough thanks for the potion in her belly.

She assumed from the start that the Judge would not keep the skullcap in one of the packs left accessible around the camp. A quick perusal of the woman's supplies confirmed it. Stealing the Judge's helmet in revenge proved equally unlikely. The woman had gone to sleep with one arm wrapped protectively around the helm, head tucked against the metal, guarded even in her dreams.

Finding the Wyrm first is the one clean victory that Fran expects to manage. She has a head start on the hunt. But while she has time, she lacks a spear and concentration both; some point has been crossed in her brain since her battle with the Judge and the night resulting after. Exhaustion muddles her wits and will not give them back.

When she lowers herself gingerly down a path that is steep enough to be a fall, her breath hitches in surprise to discover a pale flank moving through the brush.

The Albino Wyrm is smaller than its cousins, but not by much. Fran backtracks the route through the canyon where it is foraging. She cannot take the high path to whittle its strength down with range alone; there will be risk, confronting it directly on the rocky soil, but she is confident in her ability to keep out of its reach.

The first volley of arrows is sacrificial. Like wasps, they snap at the Wyrm's hind legs, hunting tendon and muscle beneath the hard scales. The Wyrm snaps its head around; the silver ring wobbles at the sudden speed, hovering eternally in a halo around the boxy, blunt-nosed skull.

The second set of arrows -- only two, conserving ammunition until she can maneuver the Wyrm to expose its neck -- slam into the beast's paw when it picks one foot up to advance. Rather than bellowing in pain, the monster dips its head, plucking out the offending shafts as if to nibble away two thorns. When it glances up again, it fixates its attention on her.

The thrummings of the metal ring pick up speed. Fran braces herself to roll out of the way, patiently gauging how far the breath will reach.

But instead of a predictable gout of flame rippling forth, a crackle of frost licks forth from the maw of the beast. Time slows to an impossible crawl. The temperature plummets. Winds cloud; the sky freezes. When Fran breathes, the air itself turns to knives in her lungs and she chokes, feeling soft tissues crackle.

In the flurry of sudden winter, she does not sense the tail lash coming until it is too late.

It takes her across the ribs. She curls into it automatically, soaking the impact as best she can; it pitches her like a rag doll through the air, a fast crack of the whip that rouses her bones back to sensation just in time to leave them aching. The ground skids into her shoulder.

_This was not on the boards,_ Fran thinks with dismay, blinking frozen lashes to watch the Wyrm rear tall. The wheel has already begun to spin again. She has not brought bangles to ward off the cold. She is not prepared for this.

And Judge Drace is suddenly there on the heels of a battle roar, hafts of her maces crossed in an impenetrable shield. Dust plumes rise around her feet like smoke, as if she is dancing on fire, daring the earth to burn her.

The maces hum. Judge Drace keeps the smaller one head-down to match each assault of the Wyrm's paws; she conserves her motions, allowing oblique slashes to glance off her armor while concentrating on selective blocks. Her great-mace rolls the air.

But the amount of damage being inflicted is too slight. The Wyrm recoils for a moment, if that. The Judge is forming a distraction, Fran realizes -- a distraction and a taunt, holding back the wave so that another may act.

Her fingers gloss the wood of her longbow.

She has never thought to work with a Hume before, but there is a gladness in the act when she reaches for her quiver, an unbidden nostalgia in the roof of her mouth that tastes of Golmore Jungle. It is good, partnership. It is missed.

The arrow finds the string before Fran has time to doubt. It flies true over Judge Drace's shoulder, slamming into the Wyrm's cheek; the second projectile embed itself in the monster's foreleg. For a gut-wrenching moment, it sways its head towards Fran's direction, lungs heaving as it sucks in air; then Judge Drace's mace cracks into the Wyrm's knee with a sound like oakwood falling, and the beast turns back to spit liquid frost over the Judge instead.

At first it sounds like the Judge Drace is screaming her own death-cry while remaining upright, howls mixing with the crackle of ice. A torrent of ice has engulfed the woman; her voice is a thin note of clarity, struggling out of the storm.

"The eyes," she is repeating, over and over, "take out the eyes!"

Fran does not have the heart to call back the truth: the thick ridge of the Wyrm's skull already deflected the one shot Fran fired for that very target. The angle is wrong.

But the beast's head turns, tracking the Judge, and Fran sees her chance.

The arrow flies true.

It sinks into the whorl of the Wyrm's earfold, feathering the monster's bones. Judge Drace wastes no time; she pushes forward, the smaller mace reversed at last as both weapons swing forth in a brutal attack.

The monstrous jaw cracks, hanging open with all its teeth arranged. Drace follows the blow with a downsweep to one foreleg. The Wyrm crashes to the ground, head lowered, and Drace hammers the great-mace down in a final strike that bloodies the sun in a glorious, perfect arc.

Fran can smell the gore on the breeze. She pants anyway, taking in fresh air, deep draughts that leave her nerves humming. She knows the beast's death to be confirmed when Drace wrestles off her helmet, hair as tousled as a thistle from sweat and grime. She grins.

Exhilaration brings Fran to the woman's side. Neither of them have suffered permanent wounds; the Wyrm's tail has stopped twitching, and the danger is gone. Victory has arrived. The Mark has been seized.

She does not fight back when the Judge seizes her shoulder, pulls her down, and kisses her.

It is not a gesture of love. Drace is breathless as well, and they are both heady with magick and bloodlust. This is the last fight that must come, between victors -- between who will win and who will lose, for there can only be one triumph to rule the day, in the end. It cannot be shared.

Cannot, or will not. Fran has no interest in the distinction between either. Her hands are snaking between the bulges of Drace's armor, past the first line of defense at last to work on the second. The metal is so frigid it burns. One of the leather straps cracks when Fran tries to unbuckle it; she compensates by snapping it off, peeling away one of Drace's pauldrons and throwing it aside. Drace's skin, underneath, is as cold as forgotten silk.

The woman reacts by grabbing for Fran's arm, more merciless now than ever they have fought before. Her gauntlet wraps itself around Fran's wrist and _twists_ hard.

They wrestle with a ferocity that borders on war. Fran refuses to be tied. She will not be bound. She rips away each piece of the Judge's armor that might provide an edge in mass, flipping Drace over again and again each time the woman seeks to use her weight as leverage.

Drace's mouth is hot on her breast. Her gauntlets are chilled, and Fran works on them next, allowing the woman free reign for only a moment; in those sparse seconds, Drace shifts her tongue from nipple to neck, and then to ear, tracing the sensitive inner curves with patient cruelty.

Fran's spine jerks. She almost lets herself fall sway to the sensation -- _almost_ \-- and then she takes in a deep breath, and shoves Drace flat onto the puddle of the Judge's cloak, cream skin bare upon Archades's crest.

At first, Drace shudders at the first touch of Fran's nails sliding along her waist. She does not allow herself to relax even when Fran moves her hand down further, fingers careful, knuckles bent to keep the nails from scraping delicate flesh. She starts to tighten her hands on Fran's arms to fight again, and then Fran shifts her hand lower to take advantage of the slick heat waiting there, and Drace's mouth parts in a sigh.

Fran has the advantage of reach. She can touch Drace between the legs without the woman being able to touch her back, and she can feel Drace reacting with each slow circle of her hand. Drace has begun to bite her lip even as her hips have given up all illusion of resistance, making small arches upwards, small jerks of yearning. She pants against the soft hairs of Fran's ears before managing to recover, and bites a warning out in the skin of Fran's shoulder.

Ignoring the momentary pain, Fran leans down to lick the underside of the woman's jaw, and then pulls away before she can be trapped in a second kiss.

Drace gives a soft moan deep in her throat, the muscles of her arms tight and angry where she is gripping Fran, giving up entirely on fighting back save to grasp at shoulder and ribs and breast. Fran works her hand faster to meet each of the woman's motions, confident for the victory, grimly satisfied even though her own breathing is as rapid as her pulse -- tense and hungry.

And then Drace twists her hips suddenly out of reach, shoving her weight forward to part Fran's knees, and lowers her mouth.

* * *

It is early evening before Fran decides to move. She is not certain which of them has won. Drace is already gone from her side, which implies that the Judge believes herself the victor. Drace has likely seized the best trophy already, which means Fran should be quick about taking a second, and then back to town so that she can attempt to make sole claim on the bounty reward.

But no amount of urgency works to rouse her muscles. A warm lassitude is encircling the world instead, defined in the sweat that is drying on Fran's stomach. When she tries to force her limbs to action, her lungs make a little sigh, and contentment purrs up through her nerves.

When finally she can surrender no further to her own relaxation, Fran rolls over to examine what has been taken from the corpse as proof of its death.

The Wyrm is intact.

The kill, she realizes, belongs to her.

Uncertain of the final result, Fran pushes herself up, her skull feeling heavy on her neck. The scattered pieces of Drace's armor have been reclaimed. Fran is alone in the clearing with the corpse. No scavengers have come yet; the Mark is unspoiled, save for the wounds it has suffered in death.

Then boots scrape on stone, and Fran glances up to find a metal silhouette waiting on the cliffs above her.

She lifts her hand in acknowledgement and thanks for the trophy right.

When Drace lifts one back, Fran's cap is dangling from it.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Spoils](https://archiveofourown.org/works/171819) by Anonymous 




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